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Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

German Chemist living in the USA. American since 2024. Former 3M engineer and inventor, working on plastic films and adhesives for LCD displays, now running my […]

🌉 bridged from ⁂ https://mastodon.social/@carstenfranke, follow @ap.brid.gy to interact

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Reposted by Carsten Franke

Street Art Utopia

@streetartutopia.mastodon.online.ap.brid.gy

London doing the work ! ❤️‍🩹

Photo of a London bus stop shelter at Nutfield Close with a protest-style poster that reads, “You know who’s not in the Epstein files? Immigrants, muslims and trans people. You know who is? Billionaires.” The poster includes cut-out photos of four wealthy, well-known men along the bottom, and the shelter is branded JCDecaux on a sunny street with bare winter trees in the background.

February 5, 2026 at 10:15 PM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

Thanks to German pharmacist and doctor friends I got my dengue fever vaccine today... It is a vaccine approved all over the world, but not in the US... #dengue #vaccine
@autolycos

February 5, 2026 at 10:37 PM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

If your currency loses 13% of value in a day, or 60% in half a year, you don't have a currency. You have a ponzy scheme that ran out of buyers.

Price chart for Bitcoin on 2/5/2026 showing a 13% drop

February 5, 2026 at 10:21 PM

Reposted by Carsten Franke

Steve Vladeck

@stevevladeck.bsky.social

Even if you don't have time to read all 83 pages of Judge Reyes's opinion barring the Trump administration from rescinding Temporary Protected Status for 350,000+ Haitians, please at least check out the four-page introduction.

It's a tour de force:

storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

"On December 2, 1783, then-Commander-in-Chief George Washington penned: “America is open to receive not only the Opulent & respected Stranger, but the oppressed & persecuted of all Nations & Religions.”1
More than two centuries later, Congress reaffirmed President Washington’s vision by establishing the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) program. See 8 U.S.C. § 1254a (TPS statute). It provides humanitarian relief to foreign nationals in the United States who come from disaster-stricken countries. It also brings in substantial revenue, with TPS holders generating $5.2 billion in taxes annually. See Part VI.
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem has a different take. [screenshot of tweet].

So says the official responsible for overseeing the TPS program. And one of those (her word) “damn” countries is Haiti. Relevant here, three days before making the above post, Secretary Noem announced she would terminate Haiti’s TPS designation as of February 3, 2026. See 90
Fed. Reg. 54733 (Nov. 28, 2025) (Termination).

Plaintiffs are five Haitian TPS holders. They are not, it emerges, “killers, leeches, or entitlement junkies.” They are instead: Fritz Emmanuel Lesly Miot, a neuroscientist researching Alzheimer’s disease, Dkt. 90 (Second Am. Compl. (SAC)) ¶ 1; Rudolph Civil, a software engineer at a national bank, id. ¶ 2; Marlene Gail Noble, a laboratory assistant in a toxicology department, id. ¶ 3; Marica Merline Laguerre, a college economics major, id. ¶ 4; and Vilbrun Dorsainvil, a full-time registered nurse, id. ¶ 5. They claim that Secretary Noem’s decision violates the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U.S.C. § 706(2), and the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The Government counters that the Court does not have jurisdiction, and, in any case, the Secretary did not violate the law.

Plaintiffs seek to stay the Secretary’s decision under 5 U.S.C. § 705 pending the outcome of this litigation. See Dkt. 81 (§ 705 Mot.). To decide their motion, the Court considers first whether it has jurisdiction. It does. See Part II. It then considers: whether Plaintiffs have a substantial likelihood of success on the merits; whether they will be irreparably harmed absent a stay; and whether a merged balance of the equities and public interest analysis favors a stay. See Part III. Each element favors Plaintiffs. See Parts IV, V, and VI.

Plaintiffs charge that Secretary Noem preordained her termination decision and did so because of hostility to nonwhite immigrants. This seems substantially likely. Secretary Noem

has terminated every TPS country designation to have reached her desk—twelve countries up,
twelve countries down. See Section IV.A.2. Her conclusion that Haiti (a majority nonwhite
country) faces merely “concerning” conditions cannot be squared with the “perfect storm of
suffering” and “staggering” “humanitarian toll” described in page-after-page of the Certified
Administrative Record (CAR). See Section IV.A.3.a. She ignored Congress’s requirement that
she “review the conditions” in Haiti only “after” consulting “with appropriate agencies.” 8
U.S.C. § 1254a(b)(3)(A); see Section IV.A.1. Indeed, she did not consult other agencies at all.
See id. Her “national interest” analysis focuses on Haitians outside the United States or here
illegally, ignoring that Haitian TPS holders already live here, and legally so. See Section
IV.A.3.b. And though she states that the analysis must include “economic considerations,” she
ignores altogether the billions Haitian TPS holders contribute to the economy. See id.
The Government’s primary response is that the TPS statute gives the Secretary
unbounded discretion to make whatever determination she wants, any way she wants. And, yes,
the statute does grant her some discretion. But not unbounded discretion. To the contrary,
Congress passed the TPS statute to standardize the then ad hoc temporary protection system—to
replace executive whim with statutory predictability. See Section I.A.
As to irreparable harm, the Government contends that, at most, the harms to Haitian TPS
holders are speculative. But the Department of State (State) warns [screenshot]

Dkt. 100 (§ 705 Reply) at 20–21.4 “Do not travel to Haiti for any reason” does not exactly
scream, as Secretary Noem concluded, suitable for return. And so, the Government studiously
does not argue that Plaintiffs will suffer no harm if removed to Haiti. Instead, it argues Plaintiffs
will not certainly suffer irreparable harm because DHS might not remove them. But this fails to
take Secretary Noem at her word: “WE DON’T WANT THEM. NOT ONE.” See Section
IV.B.2.b.
Finally, the balance of equities and public interest favor a stay. The Government does not
cite any reason termination must occur post haste. Secretary Noem complains of strains
unlawful immigrants place on our immigration-enforcement system. Her answer? Turn 352,959
lawful immigrants into unlawful immigrants overnight. She complains of strains to our
economy. Her answer? Turn employed lawful immigrants who contribute billions in taxes into
the legally unemployable. She complains of strains to our healthcare system. Her answer? Turn
the insured into the uninsured. This approach is many things—in the public interest is not one of
them.
For the reasons below, the Court GRANTS Plaintiffs’ Renewed Motion for a Stay Under
5 U.S.C. § 705, Dkt. 81.

February 3, 2026 at 1:06 AM

Reposted by Carsten Franke

Xanathon

@xanathon.social.phantanews.de.ap.brid.gy

Go, Minnesota, go!

#minnesota #rebels #rebelloon #fuckice #blender

February 2, 2026 at 3:42 PM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

Great, measles outbreak at an ICE facility...

#ice #measels #rfkjr
https://www.expressnews.com/news/article/ice-dilley-facility-measles-liam-conejo-ramos-21328040.php

February 2, 2026 at 7:28 PM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

Oops, Bitcoin is doing something... This could become an interesting week ... (I am just watching that scheme, do not own any..)

Bitcoin price chart showing a 7.19 price drop on 1/31/2026

January 31, 2026 at 6:46 PM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

We have synchronized the cats...
#cats #catsofmastodon #caturday

Two cats, Marvel the stripy cat and Comet the grey and white cat, sit on a black fireplace in front of a wood panel wall, looking to the left

Two cats, Marvel the stripy cat and Comet the grey and white cat, sit on a black fireplace in front of a wood panel wall, looking right at the camera

January 31, 2026 at 1:26 PM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

So Democrats want to put guardrails and rules for #ice into the funding bill. And when ICE ignores them #schumer will write a stern letter, A Stern Letter (TM), to trump. Great strategy!

#senate #democrats

January 30, 2026 at 1:05 AM

Reposted by Carsten Franke

Jonathan Kamens 86 47

@jik.federate.social.ap.brid.gy

Don't be a scab, join the shutdown tomorrow in the U.S.:
https://nationalshutdown.org

NATIONAL SHUTDOWN—FRI. JANUARY 30

nationalshutdown.org

January 30, 2026 at 12:32 AM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

So what does Putin have on Schumer?

Senate Democrats and White House Reach Spending deal on DHS

January 30, 2026 at 12:27 AM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

Share widely...

#minnesota #minneapolis

https://youtu.be/wWKSoxG1K7w

January 29, 2026 at 2:32 AM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

Atlantic is reporting that Nazi Bovino is sent packing and will be retired. One can hope

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/2026/01/greg-bovino-demoted-minneapolis-border-patrol/685770/?gift=Tsjgy5hc-Y7tsZCY3EHYrYYPEwapWRKELmkhtUjTN38&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

January 27, 2026 at 12:13 AM

Carsten Franke

@carstenfranke.mastodon.social.ap.brid.gy

Learn something about the CEOs of Minnesota's biggest companies... They don't get it.
Calling for cooperation between feds, state and local leaders? Continue the Target boycott... Add the others […]

Original post on mastodon.social

mastodon.social

January 26, 2026 at 12:57 AM

Reposted by Carsten Franke

Leftist Lawyer

@leftistlawyer.kolektiva.social.ap.brid.gy

There's really only ONE thing we can rely on this world anymore.

#cops Lie.

Every lawyer in the U.S. right now should be arguing "Giglio" evidence against #dhs #borderpatrol and #ice.

In Giglio vs. United states (1972), the prosecution failed to disclose that it promised a key witness […]

Original post on kolektiva.social

kolektiva.social

January 25, 2026 at 11:28 PM